https://ghananewsagency.org/

Africa population projects 2.5 billion by 2050

Rabat (Morocco), Sept. 11, GNA – Africa is
expected to double her population from 1.2 billion to about 2.5 billion people
by 2050.

Africans have therefore been urged to avoid
polygamous marriages, opt for family planning services and to reduce child
birth and control population growth.

Leaders on the continent must consider
investing hugely in health and education, create decent jobs to push rapid
socio-economic development, and improve on the livelihoods of the people.

Dr Reiner Klinghoz, a former Director of the
Berlin Institute for Population and Development who gave the advice, said
Africa must stepped up measures to reduce child mortality as well.

He said African leaders were role models on
their continent, and they ought to plan their families well so they could
thereby implement policies that would control population growth as well.

Dr Klinghoz indicated it was important
Africa achieved set targets for the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by
2030, so the leaders must also focus much attention on investing in their human
resource development and creating decent works for their people.

He was addressing Journalists attending a
five-day Media and Migration school, underway in Rabat, Morocco, aimed at
building bridges between Journalists in Europe and Africa on migration.

Dubbed: “Journalism in a global
context-challenge migration”, the Institute in close partnership with the
Africa Institute of Media, Migration and Development (AIMMAD), the AMI and
Goethe Institute with funding from the Robert Bosch Stiftung is organising the
September School.

Dr Klinghoz observed among the identifiable
driving forces of migration Africa - income, security and living standard gaps,
education and environment- population growth and poverty remained key factors
on the continent.

He called on European Union to show interest
in the development of Africa particularly in the area of investing in her
people and job creation to reduce all forms of migration to the EU countries.

Dr Gotz Schmidt-Bremme, the German
Ambassador to Morocco, said his country believed in vocational training as a
possible remedy to control migration and called on African leaders to focus on
that direction.

He said in 2015 alone out of the about 260
million migrants who cross borders to Europe, only 150 million of them were
labour migrants, and most of them had no legal stay.

In his opinion, Dr Schmidt-Bremme said
migration should not be a necessity for African migrants but a choice, hence
the need for African governments to address issues of poverty, independent
justice and rapid population growth.

Dr Schmidt-Bremme expressed regret that some
migrants go through exploitation, commercial sex work, and engaged in various
crimes in destination countries, a situation which he added remained a great
worry to the EU.